---
name: "spong-ack"
section: "1"
platform: "linux"
package: "spong-client"
version: "2.7.7-22"
release: "Debian 5.0 (Lenny)"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/spong-ack"
---

# spong-ack(1)

Spong acknowledgment tool

## NAME

**spong-ack** - Spong acknowledgment tool

## SYNOPSIS

**spong-ack** \[**--debug**\] \[**--batch**\] host services time \[message\]

**spong-ack** \[**--debug**\] **--delete** ack-id

## DESCRIPTION

When a spong event occurs (or will occur), you can use this tool to acknowledge that you know that there is a problem. You can provide text that will be seen by others looking at the event (via a spong display program). You can specify at time limit that the problem will occur. If a problem has been acknowledged, you will no longer received notifications of the problem, and the display programs will show the status of the service as "blue".

## OPTIONS

- **--debug**

  Print debugging statements. This option can be specified while creating or deleting acks.

- **--batch**

  Print the ack-id instead of the normal output. The primary use of this parameter is for scripts. An ack can be created when a job that runs causes a service to temporarily exceed it's normally limits, or if a service is taken down for an unknown or irregular length of time.

- **--delete**

  Delete a previously created ack.

Here is a description of the arguments for creating acks:

- host

  The host having the problem(s) you are acknowledging.

- service

  The service or services (separated by ".") or *all* services that your are  acknowledging.

- time

  The that the acknowledgement will late. This can be an offset "+1h, +3a,d +1w" or an absolute date and/or time indicator "12/25/1997 14:00:00. The date needs to be a 4 digit year, and the time needs to be in 24 hour format.

- message

  An optional message that will appear to those viewing the state of the host with a spong display program. If the value is "-", then the message will read from STDIN.

Here is a description of the arguments for deleting acks:

- ack-id

  The acknowledgment id to delete. The id can be obtained by using the **--batch** parameter when creating the acknowledgment, or by using the spong command with the **--brief** and **--ack** parameters.

## CONFIGURATION

### Configuration Files

**spong-cleanup** reads the standard spong.conf and spong.conf.\<host\> configuration files.

### Configuration Variables

- $SPONGSERVER

  The host that at least the spong-server and spong-message programs are running on. Typically the spong-network program runs on that host as well.

- $SPONG\_UPDATE\_PORT

  This variable defines the port that the spong-server update process listens on. If this variable is not defined on the *$SPONGSERVER* host, the spong-server update process will not be started.  The default value is 1998.

## FILES

*SPONGHOME/etc/spong.conf*, *SPONGHOME/etc/spong.conf.\<host\>*

## EXAMPLES

```
   spong-ack mailhub.my-inc.com all '05/27/2000 06:00:00' 'Server is being upgraded'
   spong-ack www5.my-inc.com http +1h 'Web server is randomly dying. Investigating.'
```

In a shell script:

```
  ...
  HOST=`hostname`
  ACKID=`spong-ack --batch $HOST cpu +8h 'Database exports are running'`
  ...
  # Database exports are done here
  ...
  spong-ack --delete $ACKID
  ...
```

## DEPENDENCIES

Perl v5.005\_03 or greater is required.

## BUGS

No know bugs.

## SEE ALSO

spong-server, spong.conf, developer-guide

## AUTHOR

Stephen L Johnson \<*sjohnson@monsters.org*\>

## HISTORY

Based on code/ideas from Sean MacGuire (BB), and Helen Harrison (Pong). Ed Hill original converted Big Brother (http://www.bb4.com) into Perl which diverged from Big Brother to become Spong. Ed Hill continued Spong development until version 2.1. Stephen L Johnson took over development in October, 1999 with his changes which became Spong 2.5.